It’s unlikely that any of us, every time we tune to NBC’s coverage of the Beijing Olympics, would welcome an update on China’s political intrigues. Not that we’ll have to worry about it.

As America’s Olympic network, NBC has become practiced at seeing, hearing and reporting no evils attached to anyone or anything at the top of Mount Olympus.

But based on reports from other networks – if you don’t own Olympic rights, you’re able and even inclined to report downside stuff – China, even in the throes of modified Westernization (it has embraced corporate money), remains a very spooky place.

ESPN’s “Outside the Lines” investigative program recently reported that Beijing is afflicted by acute air pollution, the kind that, in addition to presenting a health issue for tourists and a performance issue for Olympians, is in violation of the International Olympic Committee’s clean-air code.

China promised to cleanse Beijing’s air, no problem. As an on-camera experts claimed, throughout the Olympics China will simply cook its atmospheric books; it will report satisfactory air quality figures.

The PBS program “Frontline” last week recalled Beijing’s 1989 Tiananmen Square protest and massacre. The=2 0internationally enduring image of that episode is of “Tank Man,” the young man who blocked the procession of tanks summoned to end the pro-democracy demonstrations.

“Frontline” showed the famous photos of Tank Man to four current Beijing University students. All claimed to have never before seen them; they had no idea what they represented. Less than 20 years later was China able to delete the Tiananmen Square uprising from its history?

Apparently.

“Frontline” demonstrated that when most of the computerized world types “Tank Man” into a search engine, the photos and stories of the 1989 uprising appear. In China, however, search engines, with the full cooperation of large U.S. companies that s ell to China, removed Tank Man images and stories.

Rebecca MacKinnon, CNN’s former Beijing bureau chief, reported that there are over 30,000 Chinese government officials charged with censoring the Internet.

In the name of doing unimaginably big business – Westernization – U.S. companies have served the Chinese government as highly cooperative, pro-repression censors. Pro-democracy uprisings? Where? When?

As for Tank Man, who would now be about 40, no one is sure who he is, where he is or whether he still is. No one’s even sure how many died in the 1989 Tiananmen Square protests; estimates range from 200 to 3,000 people.

For a country deemed highly suitable to host next week’s Olympics, and for all the make-nice-to-China ads that NBC’s advertisers will present, China should still give lots of people the creeps.

* * *

I’m still of a mind that TV would be vastly different if network execs appeared before and/or after shows to provide their names, faces, titles and approvals to the shows.

For example, after NBC’s “Last Comic Standing,” last Thursday night, it would have been nice if Ben Silverman, head of NBC20Entertainment, provided his personal blessings to a show that was loaded with unfunny dirty jokes and beeps to edit the dirtiest of the unfunny dirty jokes.

Perhaps rewarded bonus points for vulgarity, the three featured “comedians” were the finalists. And the show aired at 8 p.m. to give everyone, kids too, a good shot at it. Is there no one at NBC willing to take credit?

* * *

The worst kind of mistake a local newscaster can make doesn’t have to be a big one. If the mistake reveals unfamiliarity with the region – the mispronunciation of a town or the misidentification of a landmark – a small mistake can be a credibility killer.

Last Wednesday, Ch. 11’s Lolita Lopez reported on the Billy Joel concerts, the last concerts in Shea Stadium. In this, Shea’s final year, Lopez reported that it opened in 1962, which a significant number of viewers knew to be unforgivably wrong. Shea opened in 1964; in their first two years, 1962 and ’63, the Mets played in the Polo Grounds.